Well, this is a bit of a twist... Darrin's devotion to him not being a creeper seems fairly more plausible.
So we are meant to infer that Dr. Feelgood used enjio kosai as field research for designing and producing his emotional doll prototype?
I just do not think it is just for science...

This clip shows Fred drawing Ping's sisters, Peek and Poke. (I mistakenly called Peek Pong a few posts ago.) He says at least one is an Hentai model and, though this was a Save Point drawing, that their existence is not irrelevant to the story. I thought at the time that he was just noodling about and was tossing us a Fred herring, but now I see what he meant.

Last edited by eomdal on Mon Jan 21, 2019 1:23 am, edited 1 time in total.

SD seems to no longer need the tinfoil hat that it had made from merciless hammering on Occam's Razor. This is a strange state of affairs. I do hope that it finds the need for it again someday.

Well, this is a bit of a twist... Darrin's devotion to him not being a creeper seems fairly more plausible.

Praising with faint damns, I can live with that. As long as everyone else is pointing out having called it in 1522, I will add that I believe mine was the first post in that thread to claim he wasn't an EK date of Junko's, but someone with a significant relation to Ping.

I believe I was the first to explicitly refer to her as Ping's "Old Man" (i.e. father, as put forth in point #4 of this), unless someone can point to an earlier usage.

Teddy-Werebear op cit wrote:
So we are meant to infer that Dr. Feelgood used enjio kosai as field research for designing and producing his emotional doll prototype?
I just do not think it is just for science...

Hmm, sorry, still going with my previous claim about this having been done without anything potentially perceived as inappropriate like EK. To sum that argument up in a nutshell, Sony Corp Legal would never approve something like sending out design team members on "dates" with the local, er, "providers". (Imagine the expense vouchers they'd bring back from those little "field trips" ). I've mentioned this before too, but the key observation from Junko's direction is that in 1508, having just discussed "stupid lovers" two panels back, she suddenly says "That's today?" Not "that lover" or "that date". She's changing the subject of conversation.

And of course, assuming the hi-res quote of Ashe's question to him is accurate, he describes the idea of his paying for, let's say "services", from Junko as a "misunderstanding."

But… is he talking about any improper intimacy when he is talking about all the other girls? Junko seems to value this man differently — higher — than "all the other jerks" she is used to seeing.
I do agree that there may be some perceived, vantage point dependant level of creepiness about him, now we know he is (one of?) Ping’s engineers… but his overall intentions may still be non-H, PG-13. At least, that’s how I still tend to gauge him.

Anyway, great comic again — I love the twitching foxgirl ear detail!!!

Well, this is a bit of a twist... Darrin's devotion to him not being a creeper seems fairly more plausible.

Praising with faint damns, I can live with that. As long as everyone else is pointing out having called it in 1522, I will add that I believe mine was the first post in that thread to claim he wasn't an EK date of Junko's, but someone with a significant relation to Ping.

I believe I was the first to explicitly refer to her as Ping's "Old Man" (i.e. father, as put forth in point #4 of this), unless someone can point to an earlier usage.

English is not my first language, so ambiguous sometimes lol

Teddy-Werebear op cit wrote:
So we are meant to infer that Dr. Feelgood used enjio kosai as field research for designing and producing his emotional doll prototype?
I just do not think it is just for science...

Hmm, sorry, still going with my previous claim about this having been done without anything potentially perceived as inappropriate like EK. To sum that argument up in a nutshell, Sony Corp Legal would never approve something like sending out design team members on "dates" with the local, er, "providers". (Imagine the expense vouchers they'd bring back from those little "field trips" ). I've mentioned this before too, but the key observation from Junko's direction is that in 1508, having just discussed "stupid lovers" two panels back, she suddenly says "That's today?" Not "that lover" or "that date". She's changing the subject of conversation.

And of course, assuming the hi-res quote of Ashe's question to him is accurate, he describes the idea of his paying for, let's say "services", from Junko as a "misunderstanding."

And no less but as a response to my "Also what happened to 'do not suspect malice if something can be explained by just incompetence' hmm ?" too, yo

People tend to assume the worst thing always... young girl meeting with an old(er) man... must be sinister, yo.
She may be keeping it secret from her parents ('cause of EK she's doing with others) (and because he is from Sony and her dad is from Nintendo) but that's not why he'd be a creep (as you said, to Junko, he isn't one, unlike (some of?) her other EK dates). All she may have been doing with him, is filling in some surveys, meeting in highly visible places (but well away from where her dad may have seen her).

Oh but I wonder now, how did Junko not recognize THE product based on herself and other girls (I'm talking about the encounter with the electricity pole and the conversation in the cafe later, that led to Junko suggesting to upload Ping's footage to social media.

Unless...

Maybe it really is all above board, with at least Junko's dad knowing (just maybe keeping it away from mum, doesn't exactly keep him away from Junko's wallet though too...) - remember the conversation at the CoD - he's surprisingly calm about her even meeting with 'the robot', despite knowing all well what Ping is, he merely brushes Ping away as a futile effort to replace the likes of Miho.

(Learned profession OCD kicking in) Oh also that'll sort of explain the rainbows and puffy frazzles and the distress Ping is going through : she met (one of the) sources of her emotions, and it formed a feedback loop, had too much gain and went to overdrive the mood swings are totally similar to what happens when a feedback loop goes into unstable.

You know, I feel kind of stupid for asking this but the last, like, 30 pages of so have been so full of different characters, some of whom I don't even recognize. So at risk of sounding stupid, who is this person, why is she talking to the old guy who hangs with Junko, and why does she use her phone to talk?

You know, I feel kind of stupid for asking this but the last, like, 30 pages of so have been so full of different characters, some of whom I don't even recognize. So at risk of sounding stupid, who is this person, why is she talking to the old guy who hangs with Junko, and why does she use her phone to talk?

Welcome. No, don't feel stupid. Fred has introduced 3 new characters in the last 30 pages or so, and it's easy to sometimes get lost with such a large cast of characters. A good reread every now in then is the best cure for this kind of thing.

Ashe is the one-tailed foxgirl in this comic. She's apparently deaf (or at least mute) -- she and Megumi were using sign-language in Ashe's first appearance [1504]. That's why she's using her phone like that to talk to the old guy. She also appears to be a drummer, or at least a fan, since she's wearing a Zildjian tshirt [Zildjian Cymbals].

The old guy was Junko's "subsidized dating" date that she and Ping were discussing in [1508]. Ping stepped in and replaced Junko on the date, which left him here for Ashe to confront. This comic's twist shows us that the old guy is not (merely) a creeper paying a teenager to go on dates with him, but a Sony EDS designer doing field research on teenage girl dating (without having obtained prior informed consent).

The third new character is Megumi's grandma, who also first appeared in [1504], though there were mentions and one-sided phone calls earlier. She appears to be a nice old lady with a colorful past.

Patreon members have access to high resolution copies of each comic, and I think I remember in one of the Twitch streams him saying that they would be able to read it. Are there any of your that don't mind pulling them up and satisfying our burning curiosity?

Sorry, Max zoom of the Highres download reveals nothing.

It says "<So if this other girl shows up, you can buy sex from her and leave this girl alone?>".

You have to click the download link on the png to really see teh high res versions on patreon.

I hope when this page eventually makes it to print, the message will be readable.

So the identity of the creeper is finally confirmed, and is as several guessed. That was my thought as well, so nice that I occasionally get one correct, which is a rare event with me and this comic. Junko being one of the character models is interesting information however, and probably explains why they became such good friends, they are basically sisters, or at least close cousins. Wonder who the other role models are, anyone we know hmmm? The more I see of Ashe, the more I like her, I hope she becomes a recurring character.

The old guy was Junko's "subsidized dating" date that she and Ping were discussing in [1508]. Ping stepped in and replaced Junko on the date, which left him here for Ashe to confront. This comic's twist shows us that the old guy is not (merely) a creeper paying a teenager to go on dates with him, but a Sony EDS designer doing field research on teenage girl dating (without having obtained prior informed consent).

I don't see where you are getting this information. Can you please provide a reference that shows (without ambiguity) that this is the correct interpretation of the previous comics? As far as I can tell, the old gentleman isn't a normal EK client and there is nothing to indicate that Junko doesn't know why they were meeting.

by maldrul » Mon Apr 30, 2018 6:45 pm wrote:
The man is Ping's developer. His surprise and 'fourth wall' take in frames 2 and 3 are the giveaway. Ever since he released her to Tsubasa for real world testing, he's been wondering how she's been doing. Her automatic return sequence may have been triggered by seeing his text avatar on Junko's phone. She is still running the 'catalyst' scenario.

His statements in panels 5 and 6 are meant for Ping, not Junko. Go back and reread them from that perspective and you'll see. :>

Then his surprise at Ping's response in panel 6, his reaction in panel 7 along with his response in 8 are also reactions to how human she has become.

Then the last panel shows that Ping's propensity for pie was also preprogrammed by him.

Also, he didn't seem to react to Ping's heterochomia (different colored eyes) like someone who didn't know what she is.

I'd say it was extrapolated from how Junko responded to realizing that 'today' was the day for their meetup (mentioned in 1507) along with her defending of him in the first three panels of 1508, combined with the old man mentioning wanting a 'slice of pie' in 1522 and we know Ping likes pie as mentioned in 360 and 1172.

Bringer of pointless claims and false theories
Self imposed president of the 'I *heart* TWB' fan club

I don't see where you are getting this information. Can you please provide a reference that shows (without ambiguity) that this is the correct interpretation of the previous comics? As far as I can tell, the old gentleman isn't a normal EK client and there is nothing to indicate that Junko doesn't know why they were meeting.

Pff. Nothing Fred does is without ambiguity. But as Haku said, it's based mainly on Junko's reaction in [1508]. She's not going to get that excited or defend old guy like that if she was meeting him for another interview about what it's like to be a teenage girl. She's acting like this is a date, because that's what old guy has led her to believe. Much more effective to observe teenage girl romantic behavior if the girls really think they're on a date. This also builds on top of a number of earlier comics where Junko is shown to be attracted to older men including [574] and [766].

Pff. Nothing Fred does is without ambiguity. But as Haku said, it's based mainly on Junko's reaction in [1508]. She's not going to get that excited or defend old guy like that if she was meeting him for another interview about what it's like to be a teenage girl. She's acting like this is a date, because that's what old guy has led her to believe. Much more effective to observe teenage girl romantic behavior if the girls really think they're on a date. This also builds on top of a number of earlier comics where Junko is shown to be attracted to older men including [574] and [766].

In 1508, Junko says he's a gentleman, so that refutes your description of him as "not (merely) a creeper paying a teenager to go on dates with him",

Unless you believe being a gentleman is just cover for creepy behavior. Because, if you do, then I have a problem with your belief system.

In 1508, Junko says he's a gentleman, so that refutes your description of him as "not (merely) a creeper paying a teenager to go on dates with him",

Unless you believe being a gentleman is just cover for creepy behavior. Because, if you do, then I have a problem with your belief system.

I do not believe that Junko is aware of Dr Gero's motivation and underlying reasons for taking her on these dates. If she were aware, I think her reaction to learning Ping was an android would have been different, and I think her subsequent actions toward Ping would also have been different. She could have called Dr Gero and told him about Ping, which from his surprise at running into Ping she has not. She could have told Ping about Dr Gero, which she obviously didn't or Ping wouldn't be acting the way she is. She could have brought Ping along on the date to "meet her maker" and surprise them both, but she clearly wasn't planning to bring Ping along today. There are numerous other possibilities, but she did none of them. Instead, she has acted as if she is unaware of any connection between Ping and Dr Gero. Since she knows about Ping, that implies that she does not know about Dr Gero.

From Dr Gero's standpoint, this makes eminent sense. He's doing research on romantic behavior of teenage girls in order to better program his androids. To get good data, it's important that the girls act as naturally as possible, which they are unlikely to do if they are aware of the experiment. It would also be important for the girls feelings to be genuine, so he needs to appear to be someone they like, not just yet another old guy they are spending time with for the money. He's done this enough that he's good at it.

That kind of experimental reasoning has a long history, and is part of why research institutions now-a-days have independent ethics boards and stress the importance of prior informed consent. I expect Junko, were she aware of Dr Gero's real motivations, would not view him so highly. Were she to find out about it now, I think she would be quite hurt. Isn't that a secret fear that we all have? That we might open our heart to someone only to find that they were just cynically using us? Junko is particularly vulnerable to responsible older men, no doubt to fill a hole left by her failure of a father. And yes, I think that what Dr Gero is doing here is creepy.

This is, of course, extrapolation from existing facts and my impression of the characters. I could be wrong. We'll see.

Thanks for the welcome. I've been here before under a different name that I no longer remember, but that was some time ago.

I agree that Dr Gero is doing something fairly sketchy here, but not convinced of ill intent. He could be the type of scientist who views people as bugs in a jar and doesn't take their feelings or possible emotional reactions into account. He also may see himself as having done nothing wrong. The girls are paid, he gets his data. His work on artificial emotional simulation is important. Who wouldn't want to be a part of it, even unknowingly?

These girls are "dating" him for the money anyway, right? They are actors trying to get their client to believe they're really interested in them, the perfect subjects to emulate when building a dating simulation droid. That one would develop real feelings for him likely didn't factor into his calculations. Neither did them caring about being test subjects or feeling used if they found out. That's what I meant by "out of touch".

Anyway, long story short, I can see how it looks creepy from the outside, but I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt that he's not a creeper.

Or maybe he really is a sociopath. I'm not sure which is worse between a sociopath or a lecher.

@mostlyharmless

I'm sure one of the many friends Ping has made would come to her rescue. Aren't Piro, Kimiko, Miho, and others present in this hotel or soon to be? Dr Gero is soon to be surrounded by Ping's protectors. Which might be a good thing. It might make him realize that he's made something more than a marketable object. He's created a person, which would increase his unintentional ethical blunders twofold.

I know I already mentioned in a post above about point 4 being the relevant one there for him being Ping's "dad" (as opposed to an EK client); if my linked post is tldr, then like the guy said in Twelve Angry Men, "You can throw out all the other evidence."

In panel 8 of 1522, he says, in response to Ping's "Old Man" quip, "That's just something so remarkable for you to say." That's what had been subconsciously bothering me in the face of all the "eww what a perv" gut reactions, and what basically blew all other interpretations out of the water when I went back (by 1524, the post I linked above) to analyze it consciously.

There were three possibilities at the time for who the referent of "you" was in his statement: he actually thought it was Junko; he thought it was someone besides Junko or Ping; or he thought it was Ping. The first I claimed was ruled out by his confusion in the first few panels of 1522, and that you'd have to be pretty thick for Ping's "disguise" to actually make you think that was Junko. The second I claimed was silly given that Junko is good at what she does; as I perhaps a bit crudely put it, someone paying for Junko is gonna want to get what they paid for, or want to know why; but after his confusion in the first couple of panels he is perfectly fine with things by panel 5 of 1522. So this Old Man almost certainly knows (immediately as of 1522) this is Ping.

"Remarkable for you to say." He not only knows this is Ping, he considers himself unquestionably qualified to judge what would or would not be remarkable for Ping to say. Either he is overestimating his relationship with Ping (which we'd have no grounds to assume from his first few lines in the first strip Fred introduces him in), or else his relationship with Ping is an extremely close one. In the span from 1522 to 1524 "lead designer" had gone from near the top of a very short list (that I admittedly had not bothered explicitly enumerating back in the 1522 thread) up to my having about 90% confidence in it (the other 10% being "yet another Fred twist that I am never able to predict ").

The old guy was Junko's "subsidized dating" date that she and Ping were discussing in [1508]. Ping stepped in and replaced Junko on the date, which left him here for Ashe to confront. This comic's twist shows us that the old guy is not (merely) a creeper paying a teenager to go on dates with him, but a Sony EDS designer doing field research on teenage girl dating (without having obtained prior informed consent).

Admittedly in this post I didn't explicitly use the term "informed consent" -- I had already mentioned IRB protocols and didn't want to assume "informed consent" was a term of art outside medical research. I think I stated my case pretty clearly though; Sony would do everything necessary to assure that the process was nice and legal, including obtaining whatever informed consent is required by law (for situations where they're not collecting publicly available anonymized info). I don't consider it reasonable that he would be going out on EK dates without Sony's knowledge or approval; in that case he would need to shell out all the cash himself, and why would he bother doing that when Sony will cover all the expenses if things are done above-board?

The argument that he would need to see Junko's dating behavior "in situ" is a good one, but only if it's specifically dating behavior that needs to be collected and analyzed. If it were more basic, "low level" teenage girl behavior, to avoid e.g. "uncanny valley" effects as Rapierman brought up in a recent post (and has I believe been mentioned pretty frequently with regard to Ping -- of course I'm talking about behavior here not physical appearance but the concept is the same), then specifically "dating" behavior wouldn't need to be observed directly. Junko's (and others') responses in conversation on a wide variety of topics would be quite relevant to that goal. Those responses could be reliably considered "natural" enough given standard techniques like asking a few "throwaway" questions first on neutral topics.

Again, to use the "You can throw out all the other evidence" bit, Junko says in 1507 "That's today?" She has just said two panels back "Which stupid lover is it this time?" The appropriate continuation of that would be "That one's today?" Or that lover or that client or whathaveyou. Just saying "That's today?" clearly marks the statement as a change of topic. It's not a lover or client or whathaveyou. It is something else.

She's not going to get that excited or defend old guy like that if she was meeting him for another interview about what it's like to be a teenage girl. She's acting like this is a date, because that's what old guy has led her to believe.

EDIT:
Crap, I forgot another one I am always posting: Junko being "excited" on a date. Sorry but her "reaction" in 1508 is the exact opposite of how we've seen her act on one of her "dates" (the only example we've seen; if Fred intended that to be an atypical reaction on Junko's part, there would have needed to be more in-comic examples in the other direction).

"Attracted to older men" maybe, but specifically attracted to the "mature" kind who will not treat her as a datable "commodity" (read "buy her a cheap dinner in expectation of some kind of return-on-investment down the road"), but as an intelligent young girl interesting in her own right... say, someone who might potentially have something important to contribute to "an important human interaction project at Sony, just by answering a few questions", just hypothetically.

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I don't consider it reasonable that he would be going out on EK dates without Sony's knowledge or approval; in that case he would need to shell out all the cash himself, and why would he bother doing that when Sony will cover all the expenses if things are done above-board?

1) He could well be doing this on the side and without Sony's knowledge in order to bypass those formal controls. We've just seen similar behavior from the Dragonfly folks at Google, where people try to act now and apologize later if necessary. Sony's playstation division is certainly not going to be a place where ethical research controls are routinely needed, and so institutional vigilance will be less. If he is the designer of Ping (as he claims), surely he is more than well paid enough to fund these dates himself, if he thinks it necessary.

2) Sony could be ok with this. They seem perfectly fine with letting Ed blow up half of megatokyo trying to retrieve Ping. What's a little lack of prior consent compared to that?

3) Fred is not (as far as I know) an expert on ethical research practices (though nor am I really). He would likley be aware of Junko's potential unhappiness at being used like this, from a social justice standpoint if nothing else. But I'm not sure he'd be thinking in terms of formal controls and such. My point with that was more to explain (in part) why I find his behavior disturbing, not to explain some plot point. I don't think Fred would write that way.

I don't consider it reasonable that he would be going out on EK dates without Sony's knowledge or approval; in that case he would need to shell out all the cash himself, and why would he bother doing that when Sony will cover all the expenses if things are done above-board?

1) He could well be doing this on the side and without Sony's knowledge in order to bypass those formal controls. We've just seen similar behavior from the Dragonfly folks at Google, where people try to act now and apologize later if necessary. Sony's playstation division is certainly not going to be a place where ethical research controls are routinely needed, and so institutional vigilance will be less. If he is the designer of Ping (as he claims), surely he is more than well paid enough to fund these dates himself, if he thinks it necessary.

2) Sony could be ok with this. They seem perfectly fine with letting Ed blow up half of megatokyo trying to retrieve Ping. What's a little lack of prior consent compared to that?

"So you see, doctor Gero, we have this ... idea : you would go out and meet those pre-arranged EK girls. In your smartphone, you'll have the emotion sensors that will do the work, just act normal. What's important, we do not know you're doing this. You are doing this on your own accord. If you get found out, we do not know you. There is no record of you being asked to to that. We made sure that no record will exist. It must not be spoken of outside of this room. Good luck, I guess, if this program succeeds, no one will be asking the us, the victors to vindicate themselves. With proper anonymization and statistical data large enough, no one will be able to link the collected data to any of the sources, so there will be no problem. Only the losers gonna lose. So, try and do not lose, doctor Gero."

3) Fred is not (as far as I know) an expert on ethical research practices (though nor am I really). He would likley be aware of Junko's potential unhappiness at being used like this, from a social justice standpoint if nothing else. But I'm not sure he'd be thinking in terms of formal controls and such. My point with that was more to explain (in part) why I find his behavior disturbing, not to explain some plot point. I don't think Fred would write that way.

Yeah like see above. He may be facing the "offer he can not refuse" from the 'higherups'. Maybe he had his reservations... but maybe he's actually enjoying this now, after a while. Would he be a creep or an innocent victim if this was true...?

1) He could well be doing this on the side and without Sony's knowledge in order to bypass those formal controls. We've just seen similar behavior from the Dragonfly folks at Google, where people try to act now and apologize later if necessary. Sony's playstation division is certainly not going to be a place where ethical research controls are routinely needed, and so institutional vigilance will be less. If he is the designer of Ping (as he claims), surely he is more than well paid enough to fund these dates himself, if he thinks it necessary.

I'm not requiring in my model that Sony be "ethical" in the sense of good people. Quite the contrary, I thought I made it clear that Sony (in particular Sony Legal) would be taking said actions purely for Cover Your Ass purposes.

From a design point of view, rather than specifically legal / ethical, I don't see it working that way either. Product is going to have a list of Requirements, very near the top if not #1 of which will be "acts like a regular girl". How to go about doing that will need to be fleshed out in a long series of meetings involving Product, the designers, QC, etc etc. Where and how to get the data needed to accomplish the task will be a question raised very early in the process and needing to be answered long before the designers are left alone to start implementing things. Old Man coming in to such a meeting saying he has "a bunch of... er... videos of local, well, local girls, out on, you know, dates with guys. Well, a guy..." is not going to go over well. I doubt the managers would even bother getting Legal involved on that, cause they'd already know the answer. And maybe cynical of me, but I don't care how "well paid" somebody is, there's no way they'd shell out their own salary on something they could get the company to cut the checks for.

2) Sony could be ok with this. They seem perfectly fine with letting Ed blow up half of megatokyo trying to retrieve Ping. What's a little lack of prior consent compared to that?

Sony's not worried about getting sued for Ed's antics, because the TPCD takes care of things provided the proper paperwork is filed, and Sony is no doubt is more than capable of greasing the wheels when it hasn't been. It will be a different matter entirely to face a bunch of irate moms and dads suing because Sony "let" its employees both go out on "dates" with their daughters, and worse, collect intimate information on those daughters during the course of said dates. Getting all the forms stamped and the signatures collected will be far easier and much less risk-prone.

I don't think Fred would write that way.

No argument there, I am certainly not expecting to see any of my claims fleshed out in detail any time soon. In particular, in claiming that Sony would make sure their position was covered legally and "ethically" (in the sense of complying with local laws regarding "ethics"), I again am not trying to claim they'd be doing the right thing. Even if I were at all right about the above I could still see plenty of room for Junko getting upset as you say about, e.g., any gray area between what the Old Man had claimed the data were being collected for and the actual outcome -- Ping.

Despite this update. He makes the skin under my fur crawl like a Marlon Brando portrayal of Dr. Moreau...

I did say in one of my posts that I linked to above that I did not consider his being Ping's "dad" any kind of guarantee that he's a good guy (that is, my position wasn't a simple one-dimensional reaction to "bad-guy pervert"). Junko's dad certainly isn't "protected" narratively from being a deadbeat simply by virtue of being her dad, for example.

I am definitely getting the vibe from him that he considers Sony's concerns of far more importance than Ping's concerns. He still seems relaxed enough (as BetaCygnus pointed out about him having a calm cup of coffee a few threads back) that I don't consider him a specific physical threat like Ed... but to him she's Sony's property, no more no less.

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